


Aftermath

by Liviathan



Category: Crimson Peak (2015)
Genre: All elements of PTSD except flashbacks in waking hours, Alternate Ending, Attempted Murder, Blood, Brainwashing, Codependency, Eventually turns into every symptom of PTSD, F/M, Funerals, Ghosts, Previous murders, Repressed Memories, Stockholm Syndrome, Suicidal Thoughts, murder in self-defense
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-10-27
Updated: 2015-11-17
Packaged: 2018-04-28 11:15:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 9
Words: 12,488
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5088632
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Liviathan/pseuds/Liviathan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Warnings for descriptions of Lucille raping and otherwise torturing Thomas in the past.  And because Lucille still dies, early on.</p><p> </p><p>What if Thomas and Edith had both survived the end of Crimson Peak?  How would they recover and attempt to move on?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Lucille had struck him before, of course. Had often beaten him and inflicted confusing and torturous sex which Thomas was incapable of understanding as rapes. Honestly, when he’d brought the truth of his love for Edith, to her, he’d expected violence.

He hadn’t expected the knife.

Breathing became painfully difficult, as she stabbed it through his lung. Surely, she loved him enough to understand? He reached for her, but she stabbed him again. In the shoulder this time, and harder. Directly above his heart. Dizziness overwhelmed him and he began to collapse, instinctively reaching towards his own murderer for support. 

She hadn’t meant to hurt him so badly, right? She’d just become volatile again. They’d keep enduring, together as always…

Yet as her blade plunged through him again, this time in the socket beneath his eye, he felt the single source of all care in his life begin to crumble. She’d kill him. She wasn’t stopping. He could barely breathe and he couldn't see her at all, for the blood and tears. Making an attempt to speak her name pleadingly, only resulted in hacking up more blood. The utmost of irony, really, as it reminded him far too much of the way each of his prior loves had been lost. The guilt-ridden thought flitted through his mind that he deserved this. Deserved to feel their pain, even if he hadn’t wanted to inflict it.

And then she was cradling him, sobbing. He tried to comfort her, not caring a whit about himself. But he was so tired from the blood loss and stress. Her warm arms had once again become those of his big sister, and he wanted nothing more than to pretend that everything would be well. He went limp, letting her hold him.

In mere minutes, she stood. Laying him upon the floor, she ran for Edith next.

No. No, if it was by expending the very last breath he ever took, he couldn’t allow either of them to die. His body felt so heavy as he sluggishly and painfully lifted himself off the floor. But even tired from blood loss, his adrenaline gave him speed.

By the time he’d stumbled haphazardly to the lift, both women were already out the door. He was too slow. A failure, as always. They were going to die! He had to stop them!

He wheezed, stumbling to his knees in the doorway. The frigid breeze needled and pierced at his bleeding lung, and it was so very difficult to draw breath that he nearly passed out.

…No. Couldn’t pass out. They needed him. He needed to… to be there… to be between them…

Coughing out blood again, he began to stubbornly drag himself through the snow. He tried to call out to them, but the winter air stole his breath away. He couldn’t even lift himself from the ground, so that they might see him.

It didn’t matter if he died saving them; he would give it his everything. Because they were his everything. His world that he could never live without.

The machine, of course. They were fighting beside it, blade for blade.

Barely breathing, he managed to crawl up to his life’s work. The warmth of the thing was more than appreciated, in this frozen waste.

So warm. Warmth. From the steam, of course. He’d spent so long designing it. Perhaps fitting to die, right here. Coughing up the blood of recompense.

No. No, he could hear them fighting -- his sister and his love. No dying. Not yet. Had to stop them. Couldn’t move very well…

The steam, of course. It had burned his hand, but days ago. A weapon in itself, though in select portions it wasn’t a deadly one. He’d have to wait, for Lucille was the more dangerous of the two. If Edith got burned, Lucille would have no trouble killing her. But Edith, his beautiful light and warmth -- she’d never take a life she didn’t have need to.

Just one burst of steam, and they could all be happy. Could move away from here. He’d have to wait. Wait until Edith had stepped far enough away. Until Lucille had stepped towards it…

Now.

He heard a scream, but seconds later a clang and a thud. How? Who?

Shivering and coughing, he crawled out from behind the structure, to see his sister lying in the snow, and Edith with a slice to her beautiful face… still holding the shovel that had ended it all.

Tears and blood still ran from his snow-stung eyes as he watched her. Hacking up more blood, he crawled to Lucille’s side.

Why strike her? Why, when she’d already been distracted? Why not run?

Lucille… his sister…

With his hands trembling from the cold and stress, Thomas checked for her pulse. He couldn’t feel it, but that must simply mean he wasn’t checking right, this time. She couldn’t be dead. That couldn’t happen. “Lu-ci-ille..” he coughed out.

Edith took a step towards them, then a step back. She still held the shovel at the ready, seeming afraid of him even now.

Understanding struck him, then. Lucille was gone. Edith, the light of his world, had killed her. And in the snow, injured as Edith’s own lungs were, she would have been slower than Lucille. He’d planned it wrong. Edith had been forced to strike in self-defense and now Lucille was… Lucille was… It couldn’t happen. It wasn’t happening; It hadn’t!

He gave a cry, cut short by coughing more blood, and collapsed while hugging his sister to him. “We were--” he gasped, choking, “going-- to-- to live-- to-togeth-er-er… We would be-- safe--”

Dropping the shovel, Edith found the courage to approach him. “ _Together?_ She would have killed me! She tried to kill you!”

“No-o--” he coughed, clinging to Lucille. “She would-dn’t--”

He was spent. Even with the warmth of the machine beside him, the stress and the cold and the pain were too much to bear. Without warning, he’d collapsed fully into the snow, losing consciousness.


	2. Chapter 2

He awoke in a bed, with the taste of blood yet in his mouth and sight only available from one eye. Turning his head slightly, revealed that the bed was not his own. Edith was nowhere to be seen.

The events which had occurred prior to his unconsciousness, hit him with full force, and he’d heard a wail echo throughout the clinic, before realizing it to be his own. Of course, it cut off all too quickly, replaced by painful coughing, but there was less blood, now.

His face felt strange. Bandages. Over one eye, as well, which explained why his vision was so affected.

Thomas’ mind circled that painful truth, again and again. He’d planned it wrong, injured and tired as he’d been. He’d planned everything wrong and now the only constant in his life lay dead. He’d killed her. Just as he’d killed his past brides.

Yes, Lucille had been the one to kill (and even maim them), but Thomas felt responsible, as well. His love was only a curse of death, and he’d known it each time. He hadn’t been able to counter Lucille, too afraid for his brides and himself. And now finally that curse lay complete. Edith was gone and Lucille dead. He was lost. A horrified child in an attic with no love or light or warmth.

There was conversation outside his door, which dispersed as Alan entered. He looked both grim and restrained. Thomas’ gaze slide away from him as a result, unready for anything resembling conflict at the moment.

“Edith sent me to inform her of your state. I suppose I owe my very life to you, and hers as well. And yet your involvement concerns me. Why had you never tried to stop her? Why not speak?”

Brokenly, Thomas curled upon the bed and did not speak. After a moment, Alan stepped forward to take his shoulder in hand, hoping to lend him strength through a supportive touch. Yet even that failed to bring about any change. And after a few moments, Alan left.

Minutes later, someone fumbled at the door. They seemed to be having difficulty. After several seconds of trial and error, Edith pushed the door open, to reveal herself as confined to a wheelchair.

He couldn’t look at her, flinching and curling up further. His very existence felt as being comprised of shame and guilt and mourning. She’d seen him with Lucille. Whether it had been willing or not. She knew about the tea. Again, intentions were worth nothing, as far as he was concerned. He’d been involved, and she knew it.

While Edith couldn’t help but feel sorry for him, she wanted answers. And she wasn’t one to avoid the truth, no matter how harsh. “You put me in a wheelchair. I deserve answers. I could have told them everything. And I didn’t. But I know exactly where they might look for every bit of evidence.”

Yes, he did owe her the truth, but he was tired. Tears streamed from his eyes, although only the tears of the un-bandaged one could be seen. From inside the bandages, such tears stung as the salt mixed with his blood.

“Do you thi-ink I fear-r death?” he asked, the admission quiet. “Do you think-- my li-ife has… ever been better, than t-to wish f-or it?”

Edith shut her eyes with mercy. It was true that she was disappointed in him, and frightened as well. He wasn’t in his right mind, and so many deaths had occurred. But she knew what mourning was, and the tortures of his early life had not sounded in the least humane. Still, she pressed on. “Did you kill my father?”

“No,” he responded quietly, still not ceasing to cry. “Lu-cille did.”

Her tone hardened. “And you agreed to it?”

“Unwillingly.” Ashamed of himself and trying to hide his face, he realized that he could not make himself any smaller than he already was, on the bed.

How exactly did one agree, unwillingly? Was he speaking of threats, or difficult choices? Or just a simple pang of guilt for another innocent life taken? “Explain. Agreeing. Unwillingly.”

Instead, he asked tearfully, “Where is-s her… b-body?”

Stubbornly, Edith insisted, “Explain.”

“She… would pu-u-unish me. There we-re rules, not to b-be broken.”

Rules? Like staying away from the house? Like sleeping with the one they’d been wedded to? Of course, Edith had seen her sister-in-law slam down a pan of eggs, but… did that have anything to do with her having stabbed Thomas, later? Was she so violent all the time, or were her killings separate from such reactivity?

Carefully, Edith chose her words. “What punishment is worth another’s death?”

His response shocked her. “Their death and my tor-ture.” Thomas didn’t uncurl from the bed, even as he began to cough.

Unsure of what to think of her husband, Edith let him be, for now. If he truly was speaking the truth, she did not want to so strain his injuries by speaking for too long. “You must remain abed, for now. Your injuries will not allow for rising.”

She had already wheeled herself towards the door, when he called out to her, his quiet voice filled with guilt and shame. “Edith.”

Managing the door more easily due to her previous practice, she pretended not to have heard him. There was too much to think about. They were both injured and she was too wearied for further prodding.

She shut the door, he stared at the wall, and all was silence.


	3. Chapter 3

Time dragged on. They gave him food and drink, which only served to remind him of the slow deaths by poisoning, which had befallen Edith and those before her. He did not see much reason to talk, nor even to move, truly. He wasn’t supposed to be rising from bed, anyway.

For all that they were supposed to be wedded, Edith hadn’t returned to his room in a day and a half. He spent the better part of that, in tears of mourning for his sister. He didn’t even know where her body was. Didn’t know when funeral arrangements might be made.

He couldn’t blame Edith for avoiding him, of course. It was lonely, but for all she knew, he’d meant to see to her death, and had certainly not stepped in, to avert her father’s. Was this love, between them anymore? Or was that too, dead?

In spite of the clinic’s best efforts, Thomas’ health began to decline, even as Edith’s slowly improved. He had no wish to move, and ate little. The wounds to her lungs were internal, yet his broke through to air, and that was currently more difficult for clinics like this one, to keep sterile. The doctors at least seemed to take it as a good sign that his coughing no longer included as much blood.

Hearing the door open, he glanced up. Edith, still in her wheelchair, rolled herself in. He leaned himself up into a reclining position when he saw her, his gaze mournful. Grimacing a little after a moment, he glanced down at the floor. “Are you-- re-recovering?”

Perhaps it wasn’t the most tactful of questions, given the way her expression hardened. But it was one he desperately needed to know the answer to.

“I seem to be.” The words were spoken as though she’d triumphed, with odds set against her. Truly, she had, but with her hardened expression, he knew that he’d been a component of those odds.

“And you?” She asked.

He shifted uncomfortably. “I believe -so.”

“Then we should speak.” Her words caused such a pain in him that he closed his eyes to conceal it.

“If you w-ish it.”

The silence drew out for long moments, before Edith spoke again. “You were kissing her.”

He tensed so completely that he began shaking. “I--” he began, cut off by the lump in his throat. His lungs, of course, did not appreciate the sudden lack of air, and he began to cough again, for several moments. Edith regarded the bloodied handkerchief he’d coughed into, with an expression so mixed that he wasn’t sure what to make of it.

“I did,” he confessed in a murmur. Stammering, he added, “I-I-I-I’m sorry.”

“Did our vows mean so little to you?” She asked, startled by her own choking following the words. “Was I just-- another fortune?”

He was so tired of crying. So tired of self-loathing and helplessness. “You are eve-ry-thing. They were everything. You were ne-ver f-fortunes to me. To her… I-I-I… please. She just died. I don’t want to--” Again, he began to cough as the emotion built up pressure in his wounded chest. “to think badly of her…”

“Thomas.” Edith’s tone, while not condemning, was adamant. She would have answers. Being that she was all he had left in his life, he felt desperate to give her those answers. To know whether she would accept him, or consider him nothing at all.

With a short pause drawing out between them again, he tried to think of a way to describe everything. “She-- made rules. For who I might g-give my heart to. And I-I couldn’t--” 

Another choking fit, and this time Edith appeared to be honestly concerned. “I couldn’t refuse her. I… just… I-I wanted anyone to care, and she wouldn’t understand. And I… _I knew_ , with each of you. At times, she d-d-demanded I help, and I c-couldn’t refuse --her.”

 _He’d helped?!_ “What tortures were you talking about, two days ago?” Her tone was a near-hiss of rage, so much that her voice shook with anger.

Looking shattered, he seemed frozen in place, shaking as he watched her.

“Answer me,” she insisted, her tone just as vehement, with a layer of betrayal and hurt beneath it to fuel the rage.

Shutting his eyes, he let her know the truth. “Sex. Beatings. In-involvement in… the poisonings.”

She very nearly slapped him for that last admission. But as she fumed, something about the rest of his words caught her attention. Sex? As a torture? _Lucille had raped him?_ It was unheard of, by the time in which they lived. Their society viewed women as weak and incapable, while men were seen as forever dominant. Yet Edith was not one to be so easily swayed by what she was told to think. Lucille had certainly been quite violent, and capable of many a terrible thing. Edith could easily imagine the older sibling in the abusive role. Of victimizing Edith’s own husband in fact, which made her even angrier with the deceased woman.

With her voice quieting to a soft but factual tone, Edith pressed, “Thomas. Is that what I saw?”

He continued shaking, and a flush spread over his face and neck, as he began to cough again. Breathing was so difficult, suddenly. “I--” he coughed, “Yes-- No-- Yes, in-- a way.” He heaved a deep breath amidst his tears, panting for air.

“Thomas.” Wheeling herself over, she stroked his hair from his face. He leaned into her caresses, needing anyone to care for him. Especially her. She who had shown him everything of what love could truly be. With her, he’d been strong enough to throw aside his denials and fears. After a few moments of such comfort, he closed his eyes from both relief and exhaustion.

She kept stroking his hair, noticing how it was helping. His breathing was slowing down again, approaching normal, if still sometimes punctuated by wet little crackling breaths. Carefully, keeping her voice as gentle as she could, she prodded him verbally again. “What do you mean? In a way?”

It felt twisted, to be comforting one who had done nothing to avert so many deaths. Yet, she held herself to a standard of treating him gently, at least while they spoke of his victimization. His words from before, came back to her, then. That Lucille would have killed either way, and that he’d been afraid for himself.

“…Please,” he choked out, humiliated and not wanting the truth out. But those life-long reins that Lucille had once held over him, he’d now given to Edith, in her stead. He didn’t _know_ how to be himself. He felt the need for someone to order him. Someone to guide him, that he could cling to. And he’d give her anything. Any answer, whether or not he wanted to give it. Which had left him pleading now.

“Thomas.” She kept her tone gentle, but factual. “Do I not deserve answers? After everything? They are _all I ask for_.”

Shaking again, he turned away so that he might avoid even a glance in her direction. She left her hand in his hair, still somewhat regretting it, but also not in favor of the thought to let him go through all this alone. He had tried to save her, at least in the end. She would, at the very least, show him that same slight consideration.

Wheezing out sobs, he spoke. “My mind and heart-- the-ey-- reacted different-ly than my… body.” Pausing to try to think of the words to explain, he went on. “I never wanted it. If-- she-- had stopped at-- at any time, it would have-- been a mercy. But I… my body… it… I-I don’t know-- what-- what was wrong with me.”

At that, she shut her eyes, stroking at his hair again. “That happens. My friends it has happened to… sometimes described the same. Thomas. She raped you.”

He shook his head. “No.”

“Thomas.” She kept her voice gentle and firm. He didn’t turn back to face her. “Do you doubt my information? The pain of my own friends? Even you called it torture.”

“She didn’t.” The engineer sounded as though he might be ill at any moment. “She didn’t-- I… I wasn’t…”

“Thomas. Why were you not?”

The question was far too close to home, and his shaking increased, until she could actually see it, even from her vantage point.

“She-- She loved me.”

Pity filled her, to hear him say it. Beaten, raped and stabbed. Taught to follow, as the siblings had shed the blood of others everywhere. And yet still he couldn’t let go of the idea that she’d somehow loved him?

Perhaps, if Edith knew what this confusing knot of emotions was, within her own heart, she could claim that _she_ loved him, to help him understand better. But she wasn’t entirely sure if she did.

So then. Second best answers. “Would you have done it to her? To me?”

He could only cry, feeling lost. Hadn’t she loved him? They’d been so close… They were all that the other one had, but even then, he’d known that there was something lifeless in it, as soon as he’d found Edith. “I wouldn’t be-- able to…”

“Because you love us,” she supplied. Although she realized her words would hurt him, she wanted him to understand. He’d lived in denial for too long.

Panting on the bed, as his injured lung attempted to cope with hyperventilating, Thomas didn’t respond. Edith waited, pulling her hand away from his hair, to instead take one of his hands in her own. Sometimes the truth was hard. She’d learned that all too well, herself.


	4. Chapter 4

It snowed, during Lucille’s funeral.

Edith did not attend.

Thomas was put into a wheelchair himself, while wrapped in several layers of blankets. The doctors had complained of his leaving the clinic at all, especially on such a cold day. But even they could make the exception for his own sister’s funeral.

He’d learned a few things, as Alan pushed him along, coughing and shivering. Through Edith’s marriage with Thomas, she had been able to claim the right of kin, in identifying her sister-in-law. Which, while it had kept Thomas from seeing her again, had also spared him the look of her dead body. Until now.

The funeral itself was painful enough. Thomas had never been particularly religious, but he hoped the very best for her. It seemed a desecration of her memory, that they’d stolen her title, in the wake of her murders being revealed. After all she’d endured, he felt it only right that she at least be named in death, as she had been in life.

Then, of course, they’d let him see her, which resulted in a coughing fit as he’d broken down sobbing. Honestly, he would have reached into the casket to cradle her, if it hadn’t been so impolite. As it was, he stroked her hair and held her hand. Which of course drew the attention of others attending, for who held such love for the murderer of their every romantic relationship? He could practically hear the gossip and insults, already.

He’d had an argument with Alan, over the burial. He wanted to be there, wanted to see her last moments above ground. But between the baronet’s wounds and the chill in the air, Alan was adamant that they return to the clinic. Desperately, Thomas had clutched at the wheels of his wheelchair, preventing Alan from moving him anywhere, and once Alan let go, he’d had a few moments’ escape before being stalled again.

“Let. Me. Go. This won’t happen a-- second ti-ime,” Thomas coughed.

“Do you think I want a second funeral?” Alan countered. Neither let go of the wheels.

“It’s my choice. She was my-- sister. This is my-- body and I’ll-- wheel it where-- I-I _want to_ ,” he insisted, choking and shivering.

“I’ll compromise. Just until they lay the casket in.”

“Alan-n…!”

“I am not going to let you die. Think of Edith.”

Oh, there was a lovely thought, right now. If he died, she’d probably not know what to feel. She might even be relieved. He released his hold on the wheels, just thinking about it, reeling at the understanding of just how utterly alone he was.

Alan, of course, took this as assent to the compromise, and they were on their way. Again, the cold air stole his breath away, just like the day she’d died. The snow fell softly, as though all the sky cried frozen tears, devoid of the warmth which used to be.

As they began to cover her casket, Alan rolled him towards their carriage. It didn’t seem that Thomas even registered that they were moving, at all, until he was lifted up, into it. Even then, his gaze seemed far away.

They returned to the hospital. Edith was not in his room. Thomas began to shake even harder, although now they’d returned to the warmth, indoors. Between Alan and the medics, they got him onto the bed, and he just lay there, shaking.

Again, Alan tried to give him comfort, only to have Thomas give no response. With a sigh, the other man gave up once more, and wheeled the wheelchair back out to the rest of the clinic.

Last time Alan had left, Edith had come to visit him. Not that Thomas expected her to, on this occasion, just that… he truly hoped. He couldn’t stand being so alone.

It was nearly an hour, before she opened the door. Without moving, he glanced to her with an agonized and guilty expression, which he then closed his eyes to hide.

She did not ask him about the funeral. She spoke not at all. Instead, she simply reached forth a hand to hold one of his own. The tiny mercy was enough to cut through his façade, but not enough to even begin to release his pain, much less heal it. He began to moan and sob, still shaking.

Edith honestly wasn’t sure how to react to her husband mourning her father’s killer. There didn’t appear to be a good answer to this, and after a moment in which she became intensely uncomfortable, she pulled her hand away from his.

The reaction was nearly immediate. His shaking intensified, causing a coughing fit as he began to suppress wails between his sobs.

What was she supposed to do? What were either of them supposed to do? What _was_ this mess? “Thomas. Thomas, you can’t expect…”

He curled up on the bed, letting loose another suppressed wail before quieting as his sobs overtook him. She didn’t want him. She didn’t want him, and now no one wanted him…

Thomas began to rise from the bed, planning on walking to his sister’s grave, to die in the snow beside her. But Edith rolled her wheelchair in such a way as to make it difficult for him to hop down off the bed. She called for help, and one of the clinic workers held him down, as more were called to restrain him. Eventually, he’d been strapped down to the bed in a completely undignified manner, while reclined at enough of an angle to be able to breathe. If he could catch his breath, amidst all this embarrassment.

They left it to Edith, to talk him down. While they suggested that there were other doctors on the premises who might be of service, they wanted to try with family who knew him better, first.

Right, they’d both thought bitterly. As though she knew him at all.

But at least it meant the couple could speak alone, as Thomas was more than embarrassed at the doctors’ continued presence while he lay in this state.

“Was that--” he coughed, “necessary?”

“Yes.”

“What do-- you want fr--from me?”

“Where were you going?”

He’d not lie to her. He couldn’t; not when she held the keys to his very existence. “Her grave.”

“Injured, and in this weather?”

“Of course.”

Sending him an annoyed glance, she explained, “You need to recover, first.”

“For what?”

That actually left her speechless for a moment, regarding him with shock. “ _For what?_ ” How could he just _ask that?_ As though there was nothing left! Or… or no-one left. Of course. Edith shut her eyes.

Re-opening them, she carefully tried to stabilize him. “Because even if we don’t remain as we are, then you will find someone else. I fell in love with you. Don’t tell me someone else can’t.”

Looking crushed and miserable, he responded, “I’m tired. I’m tired of having no-one. It’s been days. I ask you for mercy. It’s my own fault I’m alone.”

Reaching up a hand to lay it on his hair, she responded, “This _is_ mercy. I wish you’d see that.”

Quietly, he choked out on a whisper, “Do you love me?”

She wouldn’t give him a lie, to support him. Eventually, such a lie would be ripped away from him. “I don’t know.”

“Then why…? Why stop-- me?”

“Because enough people have died.”

If anything, his expression crumpled further. Tears continued to fall.

She went on. “Because after all you’ve been through, I cannot let you die. You might be innocent. And that… isn’t a decision I could live with myself for.”

“And I must live with mi--ne, instead?”

Drawing a deep breath, Edith answered, “Either you’re guilty and you deserve it, or you are innocent and you will recover.”

He honestly didn’t feel innocent, and so took those words to be a condemnation to a life of guilt. Time though, would tell. He hadn’t felt as though Lucille had raped him, or would stab him, either. He hadn’t known the difference between desperate clinging, and love. Edith had already taught him so much. Perhaps his opinion of himself would eventually change too.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thomas has a disturbing nightmare in this chapter, just to warn you. Lots of symbolism and some psychological horror as well as blood.

Thomas hadn’t realized how truly _tired_ he’d been, after the funeral. Perhaps it was the cold-bitten injuries and the lack of food along with the stress, but he’d fallen asleep without intending it. Edith herself had stayed in the room, baffled by how harmless and sweet her husband appeared, while sleeping.

The dreams themselves, were not pleasant. He was surrounded by one-inch-radius metal pipes, which had begun to fill the room with clay-tinted water, but they weren’t stopping. He couldn’t find a valve for them, and rather than drown, he immersed himself in the liquid, to swim out a tiny door.

Drenched in red, he found himself in a room of mirrors, one of which he used to block the flood of red from the room adjacent. Some of the mirrors, he found, were full-length. But many were hand-mirrors, their handles and reflections stained red, like himself.

Worriedly, he made his way forward. There were moans. Wet coughing and hacking. Screams, some of which sounded as his own. He couldn’t find their sources. Only more mirrors.

Beginning to shake, he fled away from the mirrors, into a room filled with long candles. They covered the floor, and some were inserted into the candelabras mounted upon the walls. A small path was woven between them, and as he passed, candles went out with his every step. He didn’t know why, in the dream, but something about the extinguished flames truly hurt his heart. He knelt, trying to use other candles to relight the unlit ones. But they would not light.

Moths flew in en masse, attracted by the light of the flames. Although he fled them, his heart gave a pang as he saw them dying amidst the very fires they were drawn to. As he fled, more candles flickered out, and less moths swarmed him in the darker places he’d created around himself.

Fleeing into the next room, he found himself in the attic. The door behind him swung shut, but he could hear Lucille’s lullaby, played downstairs on the piano. Trying to open the attic door, availed him nothing. Locked. Even throwing all his weight against it, only served to bruise his shoulder. He called out for his sister, but received no answer as the attic grew colder and colder, until it numbed him entirely.

The candles… how he wished for fire, now. Drenched and filthy as he shivered here in the cold and dark. Trying to breathe even a little warmth into his frozen hands, he realized that they did not smell of clay. They smelled like… like he was covered in…

Blood.

With a terrified sob, he jolted awake, cutting off a cry.

He was still bound to the damnable bed, of course, so it was difficult to check himself for blood at all, but he couldn’t see any on his arms or legs.

Edith rolled closer, taking one of his hands. “A nightmare?” She’d had so many, recently.

“I… I think.” He was shaking, honestly so scared that it took him a moment to grip her hand in return. “I… swear, I’ll do anything you want of me. Anything at all. I… I just don’t want anyone else hurt again. Just… let me do anything for you. _Be_ anything for you.”

The request was an odd one, but she assumed it must have something to do with whatever he’d dreamt. Certainly, he’d felt alone of late; she knew that much. “Right now, I only ask that you understand… and be as forthright with me as you are able.”

She didn’t let go of his hand. He couldn’t let go of hers. “Anything,” he replied, done with fighting and pain and loneliness. “Anything you want to know.”

The blonde paused for a second, weighing exactly how sane that response sounded. The tone of weariness in it was almost palpable. He acted as though she was dragging the truth out of him, unwilling. In a situation like this one, she realized suddenly that she might be. “Do you truly want to tell me?”

“ _Yes._ ”

His eyes… there was something deeply wrong in his eyes. As though he all but worshipped her, and clung to her every word and touch. She bit her lip slightly, trying to find a better way to ask. “Thomas… if I hadn’t asked you to tell me, would you want to?”

Her husband looked both confused and somewhat cautious, as though he wasn’t sure what the question even meant. “But you did ask. And I am happy to.”

“Thomas.” She reached forward to gently cup his face in one hand. He flinched slightly, closing his eyes. Keeping her tone as gentle and giving as possible, she pressed, “If I hadn’t asked. If you had the choice.”

“I… I don’t see why that matters. I chose to tell you.”

It was like talking to a wall. Edith drew a breath, repressing her frustration. She was made happy that such a deep breath did not cause her to cough. Tiredly, she continued, “Please, just answer me.”

Looking as though he’d suddenly been smacked with guilt, he quietly responded, “No. But you… wanted it, so I did.”

Was he so desperate for her affections? “Do you want everything I want?” she teased gently.

“Of course.”

That… hadn’t been the reply she was expecting, and it left her stunned in response. He was so candid about it, as well. Like there was absolutely nothing wrong with melding himself to fit someone else’s mold.

He was so broken. Had he always been so broken? She found herself stroking at his hair, without thinking. “And what do _you_ want?”

“To make you happy.”

“Thomas… what do you want for yourself?”

Again, that confused and worried look crossed his face. As though he was slightly afraid to make some misstep. He paused for a long moment, seeming embarrassed of the truth. Eyes shut and quiet, he eventually confided, “A flame in the dark.”

Her own tears fell for him, then. She wrapped her arms about him, and after a moment of surprise, he wept tears of relief into the shoulder of her dress. “Edith. Edith, I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

She hummed her own lullaby to him then, pure and sweet and nothing at all like Lucille’s.


	6. Chapter 6

Edith’s own dreams were troubled that night. In them, Lucille had come to attack her father. Tears streaming, Thomas lay, unmoving and watching them from the floor. But when Edith rushed to defend Carter from Lucille, the noblewoman had instead plunged a knife through her own brother.

Upon awakening, Edith honestly didn’t have to question what it had meant. Victims all, were they? Her father, herself and Thomas.

She wanted to believe it. Staring at the ceiling in the hours just before dawn, she knew that it was her heart’s wish to maintain her love with Thomas. But she couldn’t allow her heart to overwhelm her mind. Yes, he appeared weak and pitiful. Yes, his sister had clearly left scar upon scar, in his own heart and mind. But as strong as her feelings were, she knew that she might be giving him the benefit of the doubt far too early.

Her father lay dead. Lucille lay dead. And Thomas… Thomas wasn’t right. Honestly, she couldn’t even consult Alan for help, because she’d have to reveal everything, and Thomas’ innocence was seeming more and more likely.

He’d saved her. Saved Alan. He’d even taken wounds from his own sister, in the name of his love for Edith. Yet still he’d known of the poisons, and three more had come before her. He hadn’t fought Lucille then. Had he?

Well, certainly not enough to leave marks such as he bore now. Maybe he had loved them. Or maybe there was more at work, here. In any case, she felt uncomfortable asking him, both because of the early hour, and because she knew he’d give her anything.

No. There needed to be restrictions put in place. Some… she shied from the word _rules_ as he’d used that to describe Lucille’s. But Thomas should have boundaries, as anyone else had. If he wasn’t currently capable of understanding those boundaries, Edith supposed she would have to teach him.

This wasn’t what she’d expected to marry into, and by all rights, she had every reason to annul their marriage. But she couldn’t bring herself to hurt anyone like that. He was such a mess that he’d had to be restrained on a bed. He was so broken that he’d admit to anything. Give her anything. _Be_ anything, as he’d already admitted.

Maybe, in trying to speak with him about boundaries, she could glean more of the facts she needed. Yet she was no doctor of the mind, merely because she’d been close with one person who had an agonizing experience in common with Thomas. No, she was an author. But maybe that could also help.

 _Let’s tell a story…_ Rolling over in her bed, she took up her father’s pen. It was far too early in the morning for the noise of a typewriter, and right now she found that it truly was the best tool for her task. She stared at it a moment, wondering how her life had come to this. Lucille hadn’t just taken Edith’s loving father from her; in affect, she’d orphaned her. For her mother no longer lived, either. And Thomas, just as he had in her dream, had made no effort that Edith was aware of, to stop his sister.

Could she expect that of him, after all she’d learned? The one time he did manage to stand up to Lucille, he’d nearly died. Certainly, his older sister had tortured him often enough that he couldn’t even be relied upon for basic sanity. In a situation such as this, _could_ there be any blame for him? Should there be?

It was more than the pang of pity in her heart, this time. More even, than the love that she could now understand she still felt for him. No, logically speaking as well, he’d been incapable. And he’d tried so very hard, in spite of it.

She watched the dawn as she held her pen, not yet even reaching for the paper. The sky, through the frosted windows, brightened with blues and oranges. Truly, her mind felt as though a new day was upon it, as well. A new era of her life.

It wasn’t one she’d asked for. It wasn’t one she’d wanted. But with the way events had played out, she felt that she might very well forgive Thomas, soon. Somehow it felt as a betrayal to her father. He’d warned her that something had felt wrong in him.

Everything was wrong in him. Everything was right in him, as well.

And if he’d fought his sister for her… Well, she would fight his sister, for him. Because he appeared to lay half-dead in the other room, and he certainly didn’t seem to be fighting any of this for himself.

Picking up a paper and a writing board, she began to jot down some of her thoughts. She had the beginnings of a new story for him, already. He already had conflict in the extreme, and a hidden villain he was totally unaware of. So now was the finding of friends (or of love, but she’d not ask for that yet). Then the fight.

Their first weapon against her, could be boundaries. To give him armor, without seeming to directly confront his sister’s maltreatment of him.

She’d asked to be told, when he’d awakened. She gave him an hour, for both food and clarity of mind. And she did her best to make her entrance a grand one, hoping to boost his confidence.

Rolling herself in, she lifted her chin and looked on him with some mixture of pity and sympathy. “Thomas.”

She kept her voice gentle, for though she had his attention from the moment she’d entered, she did not wish to make him shy again.

Reaching for his hand, she gripped it and began to smile. Quietly, she confided, “I still love you.”


	7. Chapter 7

Blinking in response, he found himself speechless for several seconds. “You--” he began, stammering due to the shock, “You can’t. You don’t… know me.”

“You love me,” she laughed. This time, the smile didn’t quite reach her eyes, but she was giving it every effort.

“Well, yes. But… you didn’t know. How… how can you love someone revealed to you only days ago?”

“Thomas…” Holding his hand wasn’t even nearly enough for this. She reached forward to hug him again, and he nuzzled into the hug, incapable of moving much, currently.

Quietly, she corrected him, “Not everything was a lie. Thomas, you saved me. You saved Alan. You faced down so much to accomplish that. Don‘t tell me I can’t cherish you.”

He simply watched her in response, vulnerable and unsure.

She reached one arm up from their hug, to stroke at his hair. He blinked, allowing it but only seeming to be further confused.

Edith’s touch was something he always appreciated, of course. Warmth and light and belonging. But sometimes when she touched him, he remembered… No, he wouldn’t think on that now. Any of it. The past stayed there and he couldn’t affect it. He shut his eyes to block out such thoughts. This was Edith. Saying that she loved him, even when he deserved it least.

“I want to embrace you,” he admitted, annoyed with the restraints. She was hugging him, and he couldn’t hug back.

This time, her smile was genuine, which brought hope to his own eyes. “Wait here,” she told him gently, leaving the room for a moment to consult the doctors about whether he could be released from such restraints.

It was a conversation of a good few minutes, in which she explained that he’d only wished to die in the wake of his sister’s death, and that now Edith thought him recovered enough to go unrestrained. But eventually they consented for her to unbuckle him.

It was getting much easier to open the door, in her wheelchair. With any luck, she’d be out of the thing, in another week. Both of them seemed to be recovering well.

“They gave me permission to undo these,” she informed him gently, beginning with his arms as he’d requested an embrace.

He flexed his wrist as she released it. The clinic staff had been by, a few times a day, of course, to help in moving his muscles. But even still, it was different to be able to move, because he wanted to move.

As soon as one arm had been released, he reached to hug her with it. She smiled, looking down in slightly embarrassed joy. He was always so warm and extravagant. An odd mix, for someone who had such trouble, being himself.

Hugging him back, she was surprised when he reached his chin forward, as if to kiss her. She pretended not to notice. No kisses, just yet. Not if he had no boundaries. She wouldn’t be sure how much was forced.

Stroking at his hair again, she broke their hug to wheel around him, undoing the buckle on his other arm. Thomas watched her, hurt and disappointed. She loved him, but she wouldn’t kiss him? Was it the bandages?

Too afraid of the answer, he didn’t ask the question. Instead, he only embraced her again, once both of his arms were capable. She smiled, finding him to be doting as always. Two hugs in a row? Well, perhaps they needed it, right now.

Giving a kiss to his temple, she unbuckled the restraints on his head and his shoulders, next. He tried to sit up, reaching to attempt to kiss her again. Instead she wheeled back, which caused him to draw back as well, startled and confused. He didn’t know the words to ask the question in his eyes, all hurt, fear and confusion.

Looking on him with sympathy, Edith demanded gently, “Thomas, not yet.”

He wouldn’t meet her eyes, clearly self-conscious. She wheeled forward again, to undo the bindings on his hips and legs.

As soon as he was out of all the buckles, he curled up on the bed again, as he’d done before. Edith couldn’t help but be reminded of a small child in the cold, huddling close to themselves with their arms crossed.

“Are you cold?”

“No.” He shook his head shyly, as though to dissuade her of any unnecessary concerns. “I’m not.”

Wheeling closer to the head of his bed, she took his hand in hers, once more. “This is part of what we needed to speak about,” she informed him as gently and lovingly as possible.

“Yes?” He looked petrified, poor thing. She squeezed his hand gently, and gave him a doting, if somewhat worried smile.

That only seemed to turn his fear into concern for her.

Gently, she began. “I love you. I want you to know I will always love you. And right now, that means discussing the way you interact with me.”

He nodded in response, listening with rapt attention.

“When we met… you did this with Lucille, didn’t you? She could order you. You would listen.”

Shifting uncomfortably on the bed, he began to avoid eye-contact. “Yes. I… I _never wanted to, I swear it_.”

Sitting up in bed, his hair was too far away from her to stroke at. So she merely kept his hand in hers. “I know that. I know that. You’ve shown me that. You’ve told me so, and I saw how she behaved.”

In silence, he hunched into himself, grief mixing with shame and a little suppressed defensiveness.

“But now you have been letting me order you. You’ve stopped talking as much. Stopped _expressing_ as much. You’ve started _obeying_. And I _love you_. I don’t _want obedience_.”

He nodded. It looked as though he was slightly more sure of himself, but his eyes… they still darted to her, too often for her to consider him assured of himself. He was pretending again, giving her what he thought she wanted.

“Thomas. I don’t want you to pretend, either. Can you be yourself? As you are, with everyone else?”

In response, he looked extremely intimidated. “I-- don’t know how? I-I could try, but… how… would I…” And there was the confusing part. He couldn’t even find an ending to his own sentence. It just… was. He was frightened. Not because it was anything he was incapable of, but because he just didn’t know _how to be_ that way. “ _exist?_ ”

She was so glad she was sitting down, right now. Because that question felt so complicated. “You know, what it is proper to ask of other people. I think you sometimes know, when you do not like something. Try to defend yourself, when that happens.”

He looked frightened. “And… if I don’t want to? If I… want to be ordered? At… least to an extent.”

“Then tell me that you are following. And we will try to help you find what you want for yourself.”

Although he watched her, she could see him brighten, at the idea. He had wants. He just hadn’t been aware of how to express them.

She continued. “And this is why I can’t kiss you, yet. I refuse. And it is mine to refuse. Until we work through this.”

While he seemed to understand her, he also appeared embarrassed, and she gripped his hand again. “So. I want you to name things you want for yourself. As many as you can.”

He gave a self-conscious little grin. “I want to show you all my love, and see each other every day. I… want away from Crimson Peak. But I want… I-I want my things, and yours, and… to burn a few things in the place, as well. The machine… I want the machine. Please. Even though it is heavy. It will take a great deal to move it, I know. I…” he teared up as his lips began to tremble. “I want a dog. A small one. Like… like the one you found. I-I am hungry. And I want to never be alone totally in life. And that’s… all I can think of, right now.”

That dog, she knew, had been Enola’s. She’d unfortunately witnessed what Lucille had done to it. And now she found herself in a quandary, because she deserved to know those answers, but she didn’t want to rip them from him.

“Don’t tell me this, if you don’t want to tell me, for yourself. Do you understand?”

While he watched her as though unnerved, he nodded. And so she went on. “Whose was the dog?”

Immediately, his expression turned stony. His eyes widened and his gaze seemed far away. He opened his mouth to answer, but… only if he wanted to say it, for himself. The wound was a deep one, festering without light for so long. And she already knew they were dead…

But did he want to speak her name?

Could he? Was it possible, without breaking?

Edith noted that he appeared almost traumatized. With his wide-eyed gaze distant and his mouth open in something that looked like fear and speechlessness and agony. But he hadn’t answered. Or told her he didn’t wish to. “You don’t have to answer,” she assured him lightly. “Only if you want to, for yourself.”

He missed her. He missed each of them, and Lucille. Tears began to trace their way down his face. Her name. Did he want to say her name? It hurt, this blistered wound inside of him, hidden as it had grown larger and larger and larger. Was it time to bring it to the light of day? It felt so daunting, to even attempt!

Stricken, he admitted it on a breath. “Enola’s.”

Edith nodded. Given the amount of time he’d spent before answering her, she was going to assume he’d given her that information because he’d wanted to. She’d already known it of course, but as much as it was still terribly disturbing, at least he’d given her the truth. Without her stealing it from him.

“And you loved her dog.” She did her best to keep her tone sympathetic, and not allow any bitterness into it.

“I loved _her_ ,” he groaned out on a tone wet with tears. “I loved her. I-I loved her…”

He hadn’t been able to speak the words before, and now he couldn’t seem to stop. Until he thought about losing Edith over it, and then darted his gaze back to hers, in fear.

She hadn’t let go of his hand. “And I love you. I love you; don’t be afraid.”

When he reached out to try to embrace her, Edith didn’t refuse him. This was going to be a long road. Especially as he wanted their things back from that place. Yet considering that everything they owned was in it… Ohhh, she hadn’t at all meant to marry into this. They didn’t have enough money, simply on her small income, alone. They needed their possessions, and to sell the Hall.

It gave her more than she ever wanted to think about, over lunch.


	8. Chapter 8

Over the next few days, Edith was able to rise from the wheelchair, stumbling along the hallways with a cane for support. She would often sit with Thomas, asking him what he wanted for himself, that day.

He didn’t seem to want much. Continually, it was just to spend time with her. To hug. As before, his words were sweepingly romantic, and she wondered if it was just his way with words, or if he’d had some kind of instruction in how to be so darling and flirtatious and supportive. The warmth he showed for her seemed very real, at any rate. He’d protected her before, and was now concerned and gentle with her, whenever given the chance.

She didn’t ask again, about his previous wives. His reaction had been more than enough to reinforce what he’d told her before: that he hadn’t wanted them for their fortunes. Lucille had.

But Edith kept trying, wondering if Thomas would have answers for what he wanted, one day. He seemed to have long-term answers, as he’d listed them before, but the only short-term thing he ever seemed to want, was more time with her.

Until 5 days after she’d told him she loved him. She asked him what he wanted for himself, and he seemed to hesitate, becoming self conscious instead of flirting.

She backed off, afraid that she might be overstepping a line. “You don’t have to answer. Only if you want to answer, for yourself.”

He nodded in a distracted way that implied he expected as much, and that made her heart soar with joy for him. He was beginning to learn to expect dignity with her.

Tentatively, he began, “I want… to go to the florist. For myself.”

The florist? For Lucille’s grave? “Stay warm,” she advised him. “I don’t want you falling ill.”

He flinched backward at the word _falling_ , which caused her to wince, as well. Yes, that had hurt. More than that, it had been utterly terrifying. But it was over now, for the most part. Currently, her brace made it fully possible to walk for short periods of time, on her broken ankle. Her back, astoundingly, was only bruised deeply.

She could still remember him shouting to Lucille, pleading with her not to push Edith. An uncomfortable silence drew between them, as they both regarded the trauma. Thomas broke it first. In a guilty whisper, he managed, “I’m sorry.”

Reaching to embrace him, she answered, “I know. I know you’re sorry. You tried. You honestly tried, and I’m so proud of you for that.”

He glanced down at her, from his vantage point over her shoulder. He hadn’t really thought of it that way, but it _had_ taken a lot, to muster the courage to face Lucille down. “I… did try. But I failed.”

She pulled back to press her forehead against his. Though they were close enough to kiss, he respected her wishes not to. His lips merely twitched into a shy, crooked smile, at the affection.

“I sit here right now, beside you on this bed, because you succeeded.”

Her face was close enough to his, that she was able to hear his quietly suppressed whimper. After a few moments, tears spilled down his cheeks. “I… I meant to save you both,” he murmured. “And I am glad… you’re alive.”

“Don’t stay out too long,” she cautioned. Only after she’d said it, did she realize that it sounded like an order. “I love my husband.”

She kissed his temple, and his smile became more warm as he nuzzled against her, cuddling into a hug. Edith gave a quiet laugh of approval, and they stayed that way, for a bit.

“I’ll be here, when you return,” she promised him, pulling back.

Thomas seemed somewhat surprised by her phrasing, having expected permission or a denial, not simply acceptance that he would do this on his own. He could, of course, do all of this on his own. But it was somewhat new, to not need permission.

 

………………………………................................................................................................

 

The other doctors were not nearly so accepting of his wish to leave, as Edith had been. He had a title, and was gravely injured. They knew he’d already ventured out into the cold for Lucille’s funeral, and they had no wish to allow him such a risk, again.

When he’d looked to Alan, hoping for any support, McMichael had merely offered to obtain the flowers for him. Which would deny Thomas access to Lucille’s grave, and make obtaining the romantic bouquet he’d been planning for Edith… somewhat awkward, at best.

He’d deflated, backing down when one of the doctors explained that this was a place of healing, and that they expected their patients to give regards to that, or leave, if they wished to.

Once he returned to the room, Alan followed. Quietly, the doctor voiced his thoughts. “You don’t prefer it, when I offer help to you.”

Somewhat surprised, Thomas tilted his head in confusion, blinking at the doctor. Thinking it over after a few moments, he could well see how things might have been misconstrued.

“I-- I stabbed you. And you know a bit about Lucille, and… I am not sure how I might respond to your sympathies. It is no dislike for you; if not for you, E-Edith might be dead. I simply… am not sure how to respond.”

These were the first words that Thomas had spoken in good nature to him, since Lucille’s death, and Alan too, wanted answers. “If you loved her so much, why inform no one?”

A hollow and harrowed pain shone in Thomas’ eyes for a moment, before he attempted to conceal it by looking away. “Would _you_ have believed me? If I’d said she could overpower me. If I’d said she’d repeatedly murdered those I cherished, without my consent, and that I’d hidden it, because I could not lose her, as well? That I tried to stop her, and paid the price for it too many times, to no avail.”

Tears fell as he admitted to the truth. “They would have suspected me. They would have hanged me, taking me from her, and she would go on killing. If they _had_ listened to me, she might have died, as well as taking everyone else I ever loved. I-- I couldn’t. Please understand; I tried to stop her. I did all I could--”

Unnerved, Alan prompted, “How many lives _did she_ take?”

“Aside from our parents, four.”

Horrified, Alan regarded the baronet with stunned silence. “Yet you mourn her. You go to her grave.”

“ _Of course I mourn her_ ,” Thomas snapped defensively. “She was all I had. The only one who didn’t die, and I was still trying to save Edith, when you arrived.”

“So she would have died, if I hadn’t gotten there,” Alan growled out in accusation.

Again, that sad and lost expression, as though Alan had wounded him more deeply than he could express. “I’d hoped to save her. I didn’t _choose_ to love her. With Lucille, I knew that to be a curse of death. But as close as we became… I’d hoped Lucille would finally stop.”

He hadn’t really meant to admit to the truth. Now he could only wait with tears in his eyes, wondering if Alan would see him hanged, as Lucille had predicted. Perhaps it was fitting, after the same had been done to Pamela.

Looking to Thomas with disgust, Alan prompted, “You risked her life, knowing what your sister might do?”

It took a lot of ridicule, for Thomas to defend himself from it, but implying he would risk harm to Edith in any way, was far beyond what he would stand to be accused of. “ _I tried to save her. I killed the only person I’d ever had in my life, to save her. Does that mean nothing to you?_ ”

That _did_ take Alan aback. “I thought Edith had killed her.”

“We both did,” Thomas whispered, agonized to breathlessness at the memory. “And yes, I still love her. Even as she tried to kill everyone else I’d ever cared for. I don’t claim it sane, but there it is. I assure you that I would have given my own life, and I often did give myself to torture, to save each and every one of them.”

“Torture? What tortures?”

It was too much at once, and Thomas became dizzy, lying down so that the room might cease spinning. There was too much pain and too many admissions, too much guilt and judgment. Between the sudden difficulty breathing, muscle tension and tears, his injuries ached and stung, as well. “I tried to save them,” he murmured numbly. “Please, I can’t. I can’t think on… what she did to me. Not… not now. She’s dead. Please, just see me dead as well, or don’t. I am tired. I honestly tried. I’m so sorry. I have no excuses.”

He appeared so helpless, Alan thought. To be honest, the doctor truly couldn’t let himself forget how this man had saved their lives, either. “Does Edith know?”

“Everything I told you and more,” Thomas assured. He still felt numb from weariness.

“And no more will die?” He weighed his options.

“I couldn’t stand it, if any did.”

While the doctor didn’t like this situation, he chose to remain silent for now, until he’d spoken with Edith. It was very clear that Thomas was unwell. If he wasn’t a threat to anyone, then Alan would refrain from reporting him, until he’d heard more of the truth. Which meant speaking with Edith. He wasn’t entirely sure he believed the baronet, despite the tears in his only unbandaged eye.


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Content warnings for in-depth mourning. See end of chapter, for my attempt at a collage to explain what the bouquet vaguely looks like.

Edith found herself stunned, when Alan approached her for answers. At first, she quietly evaded, not wanting to implicate another of Lucille’s victims, for the other woman’s crimes. But once he’d explained that he knew about the other four murders, and had spoken with Thomas, revealing that the baronet had covered for his sister, Edith was both frightened and relieved that her friend already knew.

Stumbling over her words, in an effort to both vent _and_ conceal information, Edith explained the details of her stay in Allerdale Hall.

He was more horrified by Lucille’s deeds, than the ghosts of the Hall. For Thomas’ sake, while she explained about the siblings’ childhood, she left out the story of the child, and the many rapes that her own husband must have endured. That wasn’t Alan’s to know. Not unless Thomas saw fit to confide in Alan, himself.

When Alan specifically asked how Thomas had been tortured, Edith told him outright, that such information wasn’t his to ask. That the pain he’d endured had shattered and re-formed his mind, even as he’d clearly tried to save those closest to him.

As such, she was almost obligated to tell Alan about Thomas’ trouble with boundaries, else the doctor decide that such vagueness was not enough to prove her husband’s innocence. Again, McMichael found himself horrified by the truth he’d now learned.

Concerned for Edith, he’d asked why she’d not spoken of this sooner. Tearfully avoiding eye-contact, she’d had to explain that Thomas was just another victim, and currently wounded both physically and mentally. She’d been afraid to speak such truths, for she’d had his innocence well and thoroughly proven, yet others did not have such facts as she did. What small proofs they did have, weren’t enough. Lucille had caused enough pain already, and Edith wouldn’t let her continue to do so, after the other woman had finally died.

“It seems as though you are both in need of a friend,” Alan offered with a pained smile. “Both of you may always consider me one. If you want.”

Edith’s answering smile was so relieved that it looked painful. “We need that right now, yes,” she admitted.

“You can’t go _back there_ ,” he thought aloud. Doing his best to be warm and unassuming, he offered, “If you want, I can pay your rooms at the hotel. Just until you find another home.”

Brightening, she promised, “We’ll repay you as soon as we can.”

He’d nodded with a fond smile, knowing she was too proud for him to argue the point.

 

………………………………................................................................................................

 

After the intense relief and concern of speaking with Alan, Edith gave herself some time to calm down. While she was terribly worried about Thomas revealing so much to the doctor, it would not do, to just go racing to his room after such a talk. Not only would it appear that she was covering for him, but it would leave her still distraught, and if Thomas became unwell again, needing her to be strong… No, it was better to wait.

As such, it took her a little over an hour, before she stumbled her way down the hall, knocking on his door and entering, once he bade her to. Although he wasn’t crying, he looked tearful, she realized. Honestly, her own eyes were probably a little reddened, as well.

Sitting on the bed beside him, she pulled him into an embrace, rubbing on his back. In response, he gave a sigh of relief and returned the hug, gentle of her bruises.

Quietly, she laid the facts in the open. “You spoke to Alan.”

Nuzzling into her shoulder, he answered her just as quietly. “I did.”

Beginning to stroke his hair instead of his back, she prompted gently, “What were you thinking?”

Wearied, he responded, “The truth… came out. I suppose I was not thinking, so much as reacting.” Thomas’ mind was in an awful state, and his heart was only just beginning to recover.

“Well, he has offered to be your friend, as well as my own. Would you want that?”

There was a somewhat jarring moment, in which he mentally filled in the _for yourself_ , at the end of her sentence. He expected that she was honestly asking him, not testing or pressuring. After a few seconds of thinking upon it, he decided that the assumption was probably a valid one. When Edith had asked him before, what he’d wanted, she’d truly meant it. “I… I think I would. Yes.”

“For yourself?” she clarified.

His answer was immediate. “Yes. I… do not know that I’ve ever had a friend. One that was… more than an exchange of formalities. I find I think well enough of him.”

With a small and warm smile, she kept her arms around Thomas, as she carefully drew out the truth about the rest of his conversation with Alan.

 

………………………………................................................................................................

 

It was another week, before Thomas was given a cane, himself. He hated the thing, and kept it behind him when he didn’t need it for walking. Quietly, carefully, his friendship with the doctor began to grow. There were no more admissions, but they began to trust and converse more. Oddly, the baronet felt as he had in the first days of knowing his three former wives.

Gradually, step by tiny step, his understanding of his boundaries and rights grew. He expected to be treated with dignity. Expected also, that when Edith asked him what he wanted, her words were sincere. He’d begun to learn more of his physical boundaries, over the next three weeks, learning that he was not obligated to endure any touch he did not wish to. Carefully at first, then with more courage, he began to share with her, of his own accord, what he wanted or planned. He still had a problem with what he perceived as orders, and also a problem becoming angry with Lucille, at all. But it was a lovely beginning, and Edith was truly proud of him for how bravely he’d progressed.

She wished that he would speak to her of his past willingly, as he spoke of his day. But it seemed that he avoided such conversations when he was able, and Edith didn’t want to push him too far, too quickly.

After a month in the hospital, Edith was pronounced well enough to leave it. In another month, she was expected to return, so that her ankle could be further inspected. Yet her lungs, back and face were now fully healed.

Thomas’ puncture wounds kept him there, longer. Rather than spend Alan’s money on a hotel, Edith began to stay in Thomas’ room with him. They both became fully aware of each other’s frequent nightmares.

Five weeks after their arrival, Alan removed the Thomas’ bandages without reapplying them. Meticulously, he’d tested Thomas’ ability to see, move his eye, and do several other functions. The baronet’s eye now seemed sensitive to light, and with that sensitivity, he’d lost a bit of eyesight, but Alan seemed convinced that he’d regain it with time. The muscles beneath his eye had also been affected, causing the need for his tear ducts to heal, as well as requiring Thomas to force his eye to blink, every once in a while. These injuries, too, should heal with time, but it was a slow process. In the meantime, it was important that they keep his eye clean, so that the mucus had as little chance as possible to infect his wounds. A little more each day, they let his eye adjust to the light. In another week, he was well enough to do away with an eye patch, as well.

After seven weeks, they left the hospital, staying in the hotel instead. This finally gave Thomas the opportunity to purchase the flowers he’d wanted. The hospital’s doctors had encouraged him not to strain himself too much, but he thought he could make it to the florist’s on his own, particularly if he allowed himself to rest a few times along the way.

Once there, he found the selection of flowers to be both freeing and heartbreaking. He did his best to find the perfect expression of his love for each of them.

While the baby’s breath had struck him as applicable to both bouquets, he flinched from the fluffy sprigs for their name alone. No. Better to express his love in ways that weren’t worded so carelessly as to bring up bad memories.

Once he’d finished, Lucille’s bouquet was one vibrant yellow zinnia, circled by both pansies of purple-yellow and purple primrose. He’d added thyme flowers and pink carnations as well, then surrounded the entire thing in anemones and poppies, both white.

He’d given attention to the vase and its surrounding area as well, of course. He’d selected a wooden container to hold the flowers. Not because it was the cheapest available, but because it reminded him of the toys he’d carved for her as children. On its sides, he carved two parallel spiral tracks, into which he laid the rosemary floral sprigs. He also brought along with him five aloe blooms, two of them tied with a black silken bow.

It was the most attention he could devote to a tribute for her, and yet still it did not feel like enough. Edith’s bouquet, he left at the florist’s until he was finished. Thomas had no wish for her flowers to be damaged by the cold and elements. He was given no such choice, for those which were to be placed upon Lucille’s grave.

He had difficulty, slogging through the snow and ice to get there. But he hadn’t wanted anyone here, to witness his grief.

Carefully leaning down to place Lucille’s vase before her grave, he tossed the dual tied aloe flowers to the left of it, and the three untied ones to the right. It allowed him a bit of closure, to have it all set up properly. The most love he could give her, and a very slight defiance as well. With it done, and nothing more he could bestow upon her grave, he stood in the cold, not knowing what to feel and unsure of what he might be expected to _do_ , either.

Mourning -- actual mourning that he was allowed to show and feel and not repress -- was new. He found it just as painful as the mourning he’d tried so hard not to feel, before. Both were pain. One involved more acceptance, yes, but in that acceptance, he was forced to look upon his grief, unflinching. It was hard. She’d taught him to look away. To act as though it held no importance, even as he’d always known the truth.

The past was supposed to be the past, she would say. Yet as he’d found before, death made the past very present, now. And this time, he was allowed.

After a few minutes, he spoke to her grave. It wasn’t that he thought she could hear him, but more that… he needed to talk to her. Because there hadn’t been a goodbye, and with as close as they’d been, he couldn’t find it in himself, to let go.

“I don’t know… what to do. What to say. I’d meant for you both to live. This was never supposed to happen…” Yet it had, and he was lost. He’d become stronger, not crying even nearly as often, but he felt so unsure without her.

“I… I love her. I’d loved them. And I don’t know if you understood what you were doing to me, but I… I fear you did. And I can’t… I can’t understand. And now there can be no understanding. None but that which I’ve brought you.” His voice shaky and quiet, he admitted, “I’m not sure it will ever get easier.”

“Winter… will always be different, now. The cold. The warmth. …The steam.” Shutting his eyes, he tried to ignore the memory. After a moment, he reopened them. “I might only move forward, but I-I don’t know where that is. It’s all I can do, to breathe some days, and my lungs are nearly finished healing.”

“We never said goodbye. Not that… we could have. But it would have been… more. More than this. I-I meant the thyme and the poppies. Please be at rest; I wouldn’t want to inflict eternity on you. Our lives were difficult enough, already.”

Turning from her grave, he stopped before walking away. “I still can’t say goodbye. But I wish you well.”

There wasn’t really anything left to say. He returned to the florist’s, to bring Edith her own bouquet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm terrible with art, but so many flowers were involved in the bouquet, that I found it difficult to picture it in my mind. Thus, have my best attempt at collaging a... something. It doesn't look realistic; some flowers are too big/small compared to other ones and I can't manage perspective at all. But it gives a general idea. http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a322/lividun/Photo%20groups/Lucille%20bouquet.png
> 
> I used to consult a library book on Flower Language, when I was in Wisconsin. But now that isn't possible, so I used a website. Basically, the flower meanings for Lucille's bouquet are these: yellow zinnia for daily remembrance, primrose (this kind is purple) for "I can't live without you", pansies for "you have my thoughts and love", pink carnations for "I'll never forget you", thyme for "courage and ensuring a restful sleep", white poppies for eternal sleep and consolation, white anemones for unfading love, rosemary for remembrance, and aloe for grief.
> 
> Thomas turned down baby's breath for both bouquets, for the obvious phrasing heartbreak, but it means everlasting love, which is why he momentarily considered using it.


End file.
